Jim Kremer joins PEF's Board of Directors

We are very excited to announce the latest addition to the PEF Board of Directors, Jim Kremer, who officially joined the Board on February 23, 2015. Jim brings a range of experience to the PEF Board, and is a committed, local environmental advocate.

Jim retired to Pacifica in 2008, with his wife Pat. Their first project was remodeling Pat’s family home in Sharp Park, which had not been substantially improved since it was built by her parents, Grace and Carl McCarthy in the 1940s. Among their goals were energy and water efficiency. They have photo-voltaic electricity, solar hot water and hydronic heating, and a 5000 gallon rainwater catchment system. Their home received the Sustainable San Mateo County Green Building Award for a residential remodel in 2011.

Jim received a bachelor of arts in Chemistry/Biochemistry from Princeton, and a Ph.D. in Biological Oceanography from the URI Graduate School of Oceanography. As a university professor, his research specialty was coastal ecosystems ecology and numerical modeling, and his studies ranged from kelp forests to coastal upwelling zones to estuaries, and most recently the impacts of human development in watersheds on the nutrient budget and ecological condition of shallow coastal waters. He taught at the graduate and undergraduate level, 19 years at U.S.C. (where he was academic coordinator of the Catalina Island Science Semester), followed by 15 years at the Avery Point Campus of UCONN on Long Island Sound (where he oversaw the creation and spin-up of a novel major in coastal environmental science).

Jim was roused from “complete retirement” and activated by the fight to reject the Keystone XL pipeline (visitkxlreverberations.wordpress.com). He has been a volunteer in Pedro Point Headlands workdays, a subscriber to San Pedro Valley Park events, and a volunteer with Pacifica Historical Society Earth Day and Fog Fest promotions.

Jim and Pat oversee a small Nature Center, promoting awareness of nature and conservation at a family-oriented summer community on Fire Island, on the south shore of Long Island, NY. Jim enjoys swimming, surfing, hiking, SCUBA diving and fly fishing, and being with his two grandsons who live next door.